As many of you know, Florida Autism Center is a practicum site for Florida Institute of Technology’s Master of Science in Applied Behavior Analysis program. This means that we provide clinical supervision to the students and allow them to use the work they do with us toward eligibility to sit for Board Certification. Florida Autism Center LOVES our relationship with this program. Not only do we get incredible staff as a result, we also get a chance to see these wonderful staff through conducting their thesis projects. Chrystal is just starting her thesis, which means many great things. First, this is her first opportunity to be a principle researcher. Second, due to the fact that she’s planning to use FAC kids, some of our families will be receiving extra therapy (specifically social skills training interaction, the topic of Chrystal’s thesis), and Chrystal may have the chance to publish her completed project. We’re proud of her, and looking forward to helping her out and seeing if her procedure helps our kids learn social skills more readily.

Just wanted to let everyone know that, after much searching, we’ve found 2 new staff that we’re really excited about! Liza is going to be the teacher for our front classroom and Kim is going to be filling in for Chrystal on Fridays and doing some after-school therapy. We also are offering a position in Daytona to someone we really liked, but haven’t talked to him yet, so I don’t want to post names . . . Finally, our awesome volunteer, Julia, has decided to take our after-school activities manager position, so we’re really happy about that, too! This brings our staff to 13 AND adds a sweet baby for our nanny room – one of our new staff will be bringing her son. That means we’ll have my 22 month old and 4 month old, Jess’ 7 month old and now a 6 month old, too. That means Martha will be one busy nanny! We’re so happy to have found the right people.

Also, a reminder: TOMORROW is the last day to file intent to switch to a private school beginning October 1. Go to www.floridaschoolchoice.org to file. Call us with questions. If you haven’t filed by the end of day tomorrow, you won’t be able to use your McKay until January.

I also wanted to let everyone know about some upcoming open houses in Daytona. Tomorrow I have one at 11AM. Then, here’s the schedule for the next couple weeks. These will be with me E-mail me at info@FloridaAutismCenter.net if you’re planning to attend. We’re at the Easter Seals building (separate company, same location) at 1219 Dunn Avenue in Daytona Beach.

Open House 1: Friday, September 4 at 11AM

Open House 2: Tuesday, September 8 at 2:30PM

Open House 3: Friday, September 11 at 11AM

If you’re interested in an open house in Sanford, call the office. I know Martha has several set up – 407.413.9550.

I know a lot of people start blog’s and then give up, which you may have thought happened to Florida Autism Center as we haven’t posted in over 2 weeks. Not so, though. We’ve just been amazingly busy, which is a good thing. I haven’t posted all the things we’ve been busily doing to our blog yet, which is a bad thing. So, here goes . . .

SCHOOL: We made it through our first week of school. Mind you, this was school both in Daytona Beach and in Sanford. I’m pleased to report success in both locations. If I’m not mistaken, both locations have full programming in place for all their kids as of today, and also have their schedule for the entire year completely mapped out (except some TBD field trips). We’re really lucky this year. We’ve got some amazing parents and some really great kids. School is off to a good start with 11 kids. We are adding Daytona Beach kids October 1. We are adding 2 – 4 more Sanford kids in January and might consider another 1 or 2 in Daytona for January as well. Let us know if you’re interested in making the switch – we’ll take waiting list enrollment and see when it makes sense to move you from the public school to our program.

Speaking of waiting list enrollment – it’s time to get it started for January in Winter Park. We have 2 families currently in Sanford who are interested in moving to Winter Park. We need 4 more committed, contracted families before we will begin searching for a building. So, if you’d like to send your child to Florida Autism Center’s Academy program beginning in January, we need to know about it now.

EI: Wow, EI has been through some craziness lately. I’m extremely happy to say things are going along really well with United Healthcare (UBH). Our contract with them is really moving along and we have secured authorizations for kids up to 20 hours per week. Incredible.

Concerning Blue Cross, we’re resubmitting claims from some of our EI summer kids. Apparently the State of Florida has let Blue Cross know ‘in no uncertain terms’ that behavior analyst claims are to be paid. We’re hoping so, because sadly a few of our families had to drop service due to cost, and it’s really not fair when their insurance should be helping. We’ll keep you updated. Currently, we do have some EI spots open. We have one after-school slot in Daytona (3 – 5PM daily) and 3 daytime slots in Sanford (9 – 12 daily).

BIRTHDAY: We’re still working on plans for the FAC 5th Birthday Party. I’ll be posting about it soon.

MATERIALS DRIVE: We pushed our August Materials Drive back to September. If you have outgrown toys and activities, we’d be happy to get them. Jess is still working on her yard sale to create some help for private pay families, so things you have that FAC doesn’t need will go towards that. I hope she chooses the date for the yard sale soon. There is a REALLY old dresser of mine sitting around in the center, looking terrible, and waiting for the yard sale!

GRAD UPDATES: 3 of our babies started public school this week. I’m thrilled to say all 3 did great. So far so good with joining their classrooms and peers. I can’t wait to hear more from their families, which I’ll report on to all of you.

Well, there’s a lot more I could talk about – especially after a 2 week hiatus – but I don’t want this post to be too long . . .

Apologies to Marcie, who left a wonderful comment that went unseen until tonight. I replied to your comment in the comments section, and hope you find the info helpful.

Sorry the blog’s been down for a few days. We were switching web hosting services and it got a little nuts. I couldn’t post anything and we ended up switching up the blog a bit. I’m searching for the new perfect theme. I’m going to be posting tonight about good info for families with newly diagnosed kids. Stay tuned . . .

This is just a quick note to say WE MISS YOU MARTHA!! Martha is our on-site nanny. She watches my daughter and son and Jessica (our Administrative Director)’s son. Martha’s out for jury duty right now and we miss her. It’s easy to overlook all the little things she does for us each day until a day she’s not there. In other news, I applied to be on a TV show today! I know that these things typically never call real people like me, but the process is still an exciting one. There a new show starting on ABC where people who have money ‘help’ people who have good ideas. I, being full of good ideas, applied to be on it. It’s by the ‘Survivor’ and ‘The Apprentice’ people – a couple of the only shows I ever thought I would win, so wish me luck! The show is new, so I hope it makes it long enough for them to need contestants

Thanks for posting a comment. It’s nice to know that someone is reading this! I’ve been doing some reading on what people really like in a blog, so I’m going to try a few things in the hopes that I can make this fun and more interactive. Some of the suggestions were loads of pictures and external links and to be sure I update daily. So, I’m going to work on those things. Check back later tonight or tomorrow and hopefully I’ll try to get a start on that. I guess I’ll just have to try to dedicate a time daily to add something new. In the meantime, have a wonderful Monday!